A Sincere Idealist
by vermouthhh
Summary: Shepard has cheated death, but not without a cost. Though, Garrus been too wrapped up in exacting revenge to notice. But now that Sidonis is dead, he's realized just how far she's fallen. Shepard is in a dark place and Garrus decides he will stop at nothing to try and bring her back. Shakarian ficlet.
1. Chapter 1

**01**

Garrus had never been a fan of Khalisah al-Jilani's work. He hated the press as a rule. And he was sure it had nothing to do with him having his fair share of trying to get reporter's noses out of a number of C-Sec operations in his time on the Citadel. al-Jilani was a special breed, of course -never the woman to miss an opportunity to drag someone's name through the dirt. Garrus probably wouldn't have taken her reporting so personally had that name she'd been dragging not been Shepard's, but slandering the Commander's reputation seemed like sport to her.

That being said, remembered their first run in with her years ago. Back in the good old days when they were chasing down rogue Spectres and before any of the crew really knew each other or knew what they were in for. He'd stood composed and quiet beside Wrex as Shepard blinked into the blinding light from al-Jilani's camera. The reporter threw her a multitude of questions in the form of bombs, all of which Shepard dodged as easily as she did shrapnel on the battlefield. But towards the end of the interview al-Jilani she said something that stuck with him. Perhaps the only thing she had ever been spot on about in her entire career.

"_You're an idealist, Commander. But a sincere one."_

A sincere idealist. The term struck a chord inside him because it so cleanly summed Shepard up. It had always amazed him how she could fit such a description after all she'd been through. Most knew her pre-service history from news reports and what was available on the extranet. Earthborn, grew up on the streets as an orphan. Sole survivor of the attack on Akuze. But those things didn't really hold much weight until you heard the stories behind them. How the great Commander Shepard had been involved with a gang back on Earth. How she had to fend for herself and survive in a place that treated her no better than the paint on the old decrepit buildings there.

And Akuze. Sole survivor is a term that doesn't mean a damn thing to anyone who hasn't had to hold the title. He'd learn later that she'd watched fifty marines die that day. That she had to lie there and wait in a silent battlefield until the Alliance came for her. That those were her friends, her comrades, her brothers and sisters. And she'd watched them all die.

Her life in summation would have broken a lesser person. But she defied all odds and came out the other end a visionary. A leader. A woman whose heroic sense of purpose had clashed violently with his less-than-heroic one in the first few months of their acquaintance. He'd had many a chat with her by the Mako in the cargo bay having her counteract his radical ideas and vigilante sentiments. At first he'd been miffed by her cleanliness. How did she _stand_ being so noble all the damn time? She just hadn't had to wade through all the bureaucratic bull he had working with C-Sec. She didn't _know_ how limiting it could be. How frustrating.

But as he came to know her, he understood she knew all too well the limitations. She had just been better equipped to handle them. She took her defeats in stride. She was merciful in the places he had allowed himself to harden. She thought of civilians where he was out for blood. And she sure as hell wasn't shy about putting him in his place whenever he slipped up and expressed his hatred for the system. Overtime, he grew to enjoy that about her. She kept his moral compass aimed in a direction he could live with. Helped him sleep at night, if he was being honest. _And_ she got results on top of it all.

Shepard had managed to turn his cynical, system-loathing outlook an entire 180 degrees by the time they found Dr. Saleon on the MSV Fedele. He'd taken her words to heart that day. Engrained them in his memory so they pulsated white hot and present. _You can't control how people will act, Garrus. But you can control how you'll respond. In the end that's what really matters. _And boy had he reacted viciously at first to Dr. Saleon and his entire, gruesome operation. He remembered the interrogations with his employees. Bloody interrogations. He was so _angry_ then, not at them of course but at the man in charge. The man sitting atop his macabre throne while people suffered underneath him. Garrus had always hated the type. And he'd sworn revenge. He told himself he wouldn't be happy until he put a bullet between that salarian's eyes.

But Shepard forced him to withdraw his vengeance. Of course, Saleon died anyway but that wasn't the _point_. The point was she gave him the tools to react differently, and in the end that _was_ what really mattered. Just as she said it would. And he promised himself he would approach life with her infectious, sincere idealism. He planned on going back to C-Sec. Making a difference the right way. Gritting his teeth through the unsavory parts. And he'd been convinced he could do it, too.

But then she was gone.

It was all so damn sudden. The Citadel was still reeling from the attack and he was up to his eyes in paperwork when word came in that she was dead. And it was as though everything he'd built up fell apart around him. His resolve. His patience. His finely turned moral compass. Everything disintegrated. The grief coupled with an emptying of responsibility to her turned him more bitter than he'd ever been before. The culmination of that bitterness was what ultimately landed him on a ledge in Omega, fending off every merc with a gun in that hellhole along with the effects of sleep deprivation.

When Shepard found him that night, he was almost ready to give in. He was so close he could taste the freedom of death. What would it matter if he just stepped out from his cover? Who would miss him? He'd gotten his entire team killed, after all. He had not a friend left in the galaxy.

When Shepard showed up with her red scars and her violet eyes, he wasn't quite sure what it all meant. But when he took a rocket to the face he was pretty sure it was just some sick joke. To have the guiding force of morality and integrity in his life be there to see him die. Like _that_ was his punishment for how hardened he'd let himself become. To have her perched over him as he choked on his own blood, wishing he'd been different, perhaps. Wishing he'd been strong enough to carry on her ideals after she was gone.

He prayed for death. It was what he deserved.

But he popped right back up. The marvels of modern medicine never ceased to amaze him. Or mock him, as it were. Because he expected Shepard to chastise him for his months as Archangel. To give him some speech about working inside boundaries and doing things the _right_ way for a change. But she never did.

And at the time, he was damn grateful for it. Because it gave him an excuse to become obsessed over Sidonis. If he'd thought he'd been out for revenge with Dr. Saleon, oh-_ho _he was in for the surprise of his life. His hatred for Sidonis ran deeper than anything he'd ever allowed himself to feel. It was all-consuming, sharp and haunted his waking hours as much as it did his nightmares. He allowed it to form and develop inside himself without Shepard's influence. And to be honest, he ignored her for the most part upon returning to the Normandy out of fear that she'd notice it and try and quell it.

He didn't want that. Not then. He wanted to revel in his own self-loathing and misery. He wanted to steep in revenge and the dark pleasure he got from picturing putting a pullet through the man who had betrayed him. Concentrating on the hatred made the grief easier to manage. He told himself he only had the right to be alive if he was concentrating his efforts on killing Sidonis.

He expected to feel free after it was over.

He expected to feel as though all the pain he endured had been worthwhile. The body lay still in the distance, a single bullet lodged in the head. Quick. Easy. Efficient. It was a more merciful death than Sidonis deserved, sure, but he thought he'd made peace with that. He assured himself before he took the shot that he would find solace in the fact that Sidonis would be dead after he pulled the trigger. And that would be enough. That was what he wanted.

And yet –when it was over he couldn't help but feel an itch deep in his heart that began to say that it _wasn't_. He'd envisioned a wave of pride, elation and sharp poetic justice to wash over him. He'd avenged his squad's death. This was no small feat, nor one without significance. But the longer the body had cooled below him, the darker the feeling in his heart became. He didn't understand it until he walked back to the shuttle and watched Shepard emerge from it's shadows. His heart was pounding. He felt the cool flicker of her violet gaze and the heat of her scars simultaneously and at once found the source of his discomfort.

"_Clean and simple_," she murmured with no inflection, "_Good work."_

Good work? The Shepard he knew would have never let him kill Sidonis. Come to think of it, she wouldn't have let him shoot Harkin in the knee either. It hit him all of a sudden –how _quiet_ she'd been the entire time. No questions about his motivations, no morality checks, no nothing. She stood there in front of him completely nonplussed about the entire thing. This wasn't _like _her. A wave of dread hit him. He'd been so consumed by Sidonis the whole time that he'd ignored how starkly uncharacteristic Shepard was being.

He realized then why his success left such a bitter taste in his mouth.

It was because he'd been waiting for her to _stop him_.

Somewhere deep down he'd known killing Sidonis wouldn't help. It wouldn't bring back his team. It wouldn't help him sleep at night. He still had enough of Shepard's influence buried inside him to know these things on the surface. But his heart was so heavy with anger then he couldn't do anything but tell himself and everyone around him who would listen that he'd sworn revenge. He never expected it to come to fruition. Part of him thought that Shepard would force his hand, or warn Sidonis, or at the very least convince him it was a bad idea. He yearned for those heated discussions in the cargo bay of the Normandy. Those arguments that he respectfully ducked his head at and slowly internalized over the months. He missed her sincere idealism. And part of him waited for it to turn him in the right direction.

But it never did. He'd killed Sidonis and she didn't even bat an eye. And suddenly he was more lost than ever.

Upon returning to the Normandy he barricaded himself in the battery to try and sort out his thoughts. The last few weeks played before him like film. All the little things he'd chosen to ignore. Her scars. Her heavy eyes. Her sharp, volatile comments. Even the way she threw herself at her enemies on the battlefield. The Shepard he knew was methodical and precise in combat. Lately, she'd wear her shields down to the last reserves and come back bloody as all hell and with a fire in her eyes he was wholly unfamiliar with.

There were some less subtle signs as too, when he started to think about it. Letting Jack kill Aresh. Letting Miranda kill Niket. How about shoving that Eclipse Trooper off the Dantius Towers –now _there_'s one that should have been a red flag. But Garrus had glossed right over it. Selfishly, irresponsibly.

Although, once it became apparent he started to notice _everything_. The way she walked. The way she spoke, her voice was harsher and rougher. She intimidated civilians. Bullied her way into discounts at stores on the Citadel. And hell, just yesterday she'd flat out punched al-Jilani. Not that the reporter didn't have it coming, but that really wasn't the point.

The point was -something had happened to the woman he knew and trusted. The one he swore to walk into the fire with. _Just like old times_, he'd said to her. But it _wasn't_. Shepard had changed. And Garrus was worried.

Really worried.

That night after the punching fiasco, Garrus fiddled with his omni-tool to try and find Shepard's first run in with al-Jilani from two years earlier. A quick search was all it took and in a few moments he was staring at a holographic image of the woman he remembered so clearly. The difference between her and her current disposition was so immediate. His mandibles flexed and he hardened his gaze.

The Shepard in the hologram was full of youth and vitality. Her cheeks her unmarred, her eyes wide and full, and her voice steady as she artfully maneuvered around al-Jilani's fishing. She spoke about things she used to believe in, and seemed not to any longer. Respect. Cooperation. Optimism. And there was that damn line, just as he remembered it. "_…an idealist, Commander. But a sincere one."_

A cloud settled over him.

He had to talk to her. He had to say _something_. He'd been too consumed with Sidonis to realize his last friend in the galaxy was drowning. But now that he knew, he had to reach out to her. He'd been selfish for long enough. He couldn't let her continue down this path. And if he were being true to himself, he knew he needed the old Shepard back. Because he wasn't sure who he was without her.

But the doors to the battery suddenly pinged behind him and derailed his train of thought. He quickly shut down the vid and turned as coolly as he could to meet her cold gaze. The stark contrast between the woman before him and the woman he'd just shut off was sickening. The Shepard in front of him was just a shell. Now that he was looking for it, the pain in her face was all too apparent. _Spirits, Shepard. What happened to you?_

He cleared his throat.

"Shepard," he nodded in stiff greeting, "Need me for something?"

"Have you got a minute?" she asked.

Toneless. Passionless. Lifeless.

He shifted his weight and steeled himself for what was ahead.

_Come on, Vakarian. She needs you_.

He brought up his omni-tool and closed the doors behind her. The silence that surrounded them became thick. He drew in a breath.

"Sure, just killing time anyway," he said, trying to sound lackadaisical. He cleared his throat, searching her face. There were no answers. He wondered if there would ever be again.

Spirits, this was going to be harder than he thought.


	2. Chapter 2

**02**

His first instinct was to bring Sidonis up again. Some part of him stubbornly still believed Shepard's behavior on the Citadel might have been a fluke. That perhaps now that they were alone she would return to herself and tell him how much she disapproved.

So he started smoothly, his voice a dual-toned purr.

"I wanted to thank you again for your help with Sidonis," he baited her.

He paused for a second and studied her face. But there was no change. Her eyes remained dull and as nonplussed as ever. Her mouth a straight line. He willed it to open, for those strange pliable lips to part and make way for a speech about righteousness. But her face was as still as stone. He swallowed uncomfortably.

Damn. Then it really was as bad as he'd pieced together. This was not the Shepard he knew and trusted. But for some reason, he still couldn't bring about the words to tell her. Nervous tension crept into his limbs. Her face was just so _raw_. He wanted to wipe away the edges and smooth it out once more until it resembled the one in the vid. His mandibles flexed.

"Whatever happens with the Collectors or the Reapers or whoever else comes after us, I know you'll get the job done," he said, softer this time.

It was more of a comfort to her than anything. His half-assed bridge. If the old Shepard was in there somewhere, he hoped the sentiment would reach her. Though, if it did she didn't make any indication. Her face remained blasé. Her arms folded behind her back.

"I couldn't do this without you, Garrus," she said.

And he actually thought she meant it. There was no passion in her voice but there was sincerity. He ducked his head humbly.

"Sure you could," he said, "Not as stylishly of course."

The nervous feeling flexed and strengthened inside him as Shepard started for one of the cargo boxes to his left. He didn't mind her company of course, but he always found himself a little…what did humans call it?

Tongue tied.

Yeah, that was it. A strange turn of phrase but appropriate all the same. He never knew quite what to say around her. She was one of his best friends and yet his mouth always seemed to move faster than his brain when she was around. Now, it was even more so. He was so damn worried about her and simultaneously in the dark about how to tell her so, that trying to juggle small talk was nearly impossible.

"It's strange going into a suicide mission on a human ship," he started as he watched her take a seat on the box.

Spirits, of all the topics to land on he had to pick fatalistic. He was supposed to be trying to help Shepard, not remind her of how much pressure they were under. But he'd already started on the train of thought and it was too late to back out now.

"Your people don't prepare for high risk operations the way Turians do."

He tried to work out how he could spin the conversation back onto her and segue into a chat about what had come over her these last few weeks. But she responded too quickly for him to get any traction.

"I thought you'd be used to high risk operations on human ships. I mean think about tracking Saren to Ilos," she said, gesturing a hand.

He fixated on her voice –firm, light, and melodious in only ways that human voices could be. The light from the battery made her scars glow and her violet eyes take on a reddish sheen.

"Sure but that was quick, we raced out, landed, blew up some geth and saved the galaxy," he paced a little, just to keep himself from staring too long at those scars.

The memories from their first stint on the Normandy stung a little bit as he brought them to the surface. Almost as if they were reminding him what this conversation should really be about. How he should be asking her to remember the old days too, and who she'd been when they were traipsing across the galaxy making things up as they went along. Back when she'd transformed him from a bitter, world-weary man to one with purpose.

He stopped and faced her again, "This time we've got Miranda and Cerberus and that AI all telling us what we're up against. I think I prefer blind optimism."

And it was true. He didn't like hearing the stakes, or seeing them for that matter, every time they got on the damn shuttle. He wondered if they bothered Shepard or if she'd numbed herself to that aspect of their mission too. She blinked at him, unperturbed by the confession. But her eyes honed in on him.

"Honestly, Garrus –what do you think our chances are?"

It felt like the truest question she'd asked in weeks. Her eyes looked a little like they were pleading with him for an answer. He scrambled to hold onto the sudden flicker of humanity in her face.

_Optimism, Garrus, _he reminded himself. For her sake.

"Honestly?" he attempted to sound offhanded, "The Collectors killed you once and all they did was piss you off. I can't imagine they'll stop you this time."

But the words left his mouth bitter. What he said was true, but the Collectors did more than piss her off by killing her. That much was obvious. They'd destroyed some part of her. Robbed her of something vital. And that scared him.

His mouth started to run in another direction. He was not in the business of lying, especially to her. And she'd asked for honesty, hadn't she? As much as he hated seeing her like this he couldn't live with himself if he gave her some sparkling clean version of what they were up against. That was C-Sec's style, not his. Not that it made his sudden pessimism any more forgivable.

"But, an unmapped area, advanced technology, and the Collectors," he took a breath, "We're going to lose people. No way around that."

The light in her eyes fell a little. And he vowed he would never forgive himself for it.

"Not a happy analysis, I know," he bowed his head and hurried to make up for it, "Don't worry, I won't spread it around."

Her face didn't change. The guilt started to eat away at him. So he set his jaw and nodded once at her, lining a promise in stone.

"And I'm with you regardless."

She looked at him, _really_ looked at him for a moment. He wasn't sure if his words meant anything to her when she this so far gone, but at least they'd seemed to have sunk in.

He straightened a little and took in a breath. He planned to jump on the topic right then. _Shepard…I wanted to ask you something._ Or perhaps he'd go the subtler route. He took a step closer to her but before he could get anything out, she prompted him again.

"How did turian crews get ready for high risk missions?"

Well, at least he was well versed in this kind of topic. When he had material to back up his conversations, his ability to get tongue-tied around her lessened significantly.

He folded his arms behind his back, "With violence, usually. Turian ships have more operational discipline than your Alliance but fewer personal restrictions. Our Commanders run us tight, and they know we need to blow off steam."

How'd he managed to get so off track? He'd been so _close_ to asking her. And that conversation was much more important than one about his history with the turian military. But for all his expertise in saying the hard truths, when it came to Shepard he was grasping at straws.

"Turian ships have training rooms for exercise, combat sims, even full contact sparring," he shrugged, "Whatever lets people work off stress."

Shepard raised an eyebrow, "You mean turian ships have crewmen fighting each other before a mission?"

Hmm. Guess it would seem a little strange to anyone on the outside. To Garrus and other turians it was simply second nature to release tension in such a fashion.

"It's supervised, of course. Nobody's going to risk an injury that interferes with the mission. And it's a good way to settle grudges amicably," he explained.

A memory fluttered in the back of his head. He started pacing again, a smirk to his tone. He wasn't sure why he was telling _Shepard_ about this but it all just seemed to tumble out. It was almost as if his mouth was looking for an excuse to delay what he really needed to come back around to.

"I remember right before one mission, we were about to hit a batarian pirate squad. _Very_ risky," he turned his head back at her, "This recon scout and I had been at each other's throats, nerves mostly. She suggested we settle it in the ring."

He remembered that fight. Hard as all hell. The cheers from the rest of the crew surrounding them. Sweat. Blood spraying blue and hot. Shepard lifted her head a little and smirked.

"I assume you took her down gently?"

Garrus chuckled, "Actually, she and I were the top ranked hand to hand specialists on the ship. I had reach but she had flexibility."

He clasped his hands behind his back again and turned away from her.

"It was _brutal_, after nine rounds the judge called it a draw," he said, and then as an afterthought, "There were a lot of unhappy betters in the training room."

He planned to stop it right there, but didn't quite manage to stop himself. His voice quieted a little as new memories replaced the fight. Tangled limbs. Soft breath. Moans in the dark.

"We…uh…ended up holding a tiebreaker in her quarters. I had reach but –she had flexibility."

_Spirits_.

Why was he telling Shepard this?

He turned back to her and tried to ease the awkwardness he'd let settle in the room. He popped his shoulders as nonchalantly as he could and muttered, "More than one way to work off stress, I guess."

Shepard didn't seem particularly perturbed. In fact, there was a new look to her face. One he wasn't quite sure how to read. He'd spent enough time on the Citadel to get good at distinguishing human expressions but this one had him stumped. She shook her head a little and smirked.

"It sounds like you're carrying some tension, Garrus." She placed her hands on her knees and stood.

He watched her rise. The heavy, empty way she carried herself these days.

_I could say the same for you, Shepard_, he thought.

She came to stand across from him and crossed her arms, "Maybe I could help you get rid of it."

He blinked, completely oblivious

"I…uh didn't think you'd feel like sparring, Commander."

That smirk came back to her soft mouth and she uncrossed her arms, stepping a little closer to him. His mandibles flexed.

"What if we skipped right to the tiebreaker," she asked and moved until she in front of him at the console. He instinctively moved back and she leaned on the edge.

Her red-violet eyes flickered, "We could test your reach, and my flexibility."

Oh.

_Oh_.

"O-oh, I didn't…hm," he struggled to form a response. He felt as though he'd been dropped into a hot zone with no weapons, no armor, no nothing. To say he was suddenly in unfamiliar territory was a gross understatement.

And so was Shepard, for that matter. Not that he didn't think her romantic prowess was intact –to be honest he'd never thought of her romantic prospects at all, she was his _Commander_- but he questioned her motivations. Shepard was not in her right state of mind. He'd seen the parts of her he used to admire deteriorating for weeks –her values, her heroism, her mercy, and now her professionalism?

He couldn't imagine the old Shepard asking something so…_bold_. And he wasn't saying he didn't like the idea. No, he wouldn't lie to himself. The prospect of him and Shepard having _something_ together had been a prickling thought in his head for longer than he'd have liked to admit. But this didn't feel right. Easing stress? Casual cross-species intercourse? This…this wasn't right.

But his ability to think logically had all but been thrown out the airlock at this point.

"Never knew you had a weakness for men with scars," he stumbled over what was supposed to be a smooth line. It came out jagged and wrong.

Her face didn't change. She looked…damn, he didn't _know_ how she looked. Vulpine. Inhuman. So distanced from herself that couldn't fathom turning her down. How could he explain to her now what he'd been seeing for the past few weeks? How could he say no without ruining any chance for something real in the future? So, stumbling and awkward in all matters of the heart as he was, he popped his shoulders.

"Well…why the hell not?" he sighed and met her eyes, "There's nobody in this galaxy I respect more than you."

It was true. But it made this even harder. If he respected her so much, why couldn't he just _talk_ to her? Why couldn't he say what he meant? What was it about Shepard that made it impossible for him to get a coherent thought out?

Perhaps…perhaps if he vowed to talk to her at some point before whatever she was planning happened, it would be all right to agree to it. Because he cared for her. He always had, and always would. And he would drop everything to spend a night with her –so long as it was true and he was spending time with the real Shepard and not her aggressive, merciless doppelganger. So if he could just figure out a way to have the conversation he needed to have with her before all of this came to pass, maybe it would work out.

It still felt wrong. But it was a start.

"If we can figure out a way to make it work…then yeah, definitely," he said, more for himself than for her.

Smirk still intact, Shepard pushed herself off the console and then walked by him. Her shoulder brushed dangerously close to his and the doors split in front of her. She gave him a smoldering look in passing to which he responded with a forced look of eagerness and then she was gone. The doors closed behind her and he was left in a heavy silence.

He returned to the console and placed his fist on the edge. He bowed his head a little and cursed himself for not being stronger. There was no protocol for this. No guidelines. They didn't teach you how to deal with out-of-character advances from your commanding officer on turian ships, that was for damn sure. He was going to have to navigate this one himself. And just pray that Shepard would come out of it as she once was. Even if it meant their friendship. He knew that he would sacrifice that if he had to just to know that she was okay again. Hopefully, it wouldn't come to that.

But he didn't think for a minute that these next few weeks wouldn't be the most trying of his life. And that bringing Shepard back would require every last bit of his resolve and energy.

He only hoped the Collectors would bide their time until he could help her.


End file.
